Canadian
Society for Brain, Behaviour, and Cognitive Science
Société
Canadienne des Sciences du Cerveau, du Comportement, et
de la Cognition
- DRAFT -
Minutes
of the 8th Annual Meeting of the Canadian Society for
Brain Behaviour, and Cognitive Science
4:15 PM,.
June 20, 1998 at the Loeb Building, Carleton University
President Richard Tees
presiding. Minutes taken by Don Read. Other members of
the Executive in attendance were: Richard Brown
(President-Elect), Jane Stewart (Board member), Vince Di
Lollo (Past-President), Chris Herdman (Board member,
Treasurer, BBCS representative for Canadian Consortium of
Researchers: CRR and CPA: Scientific Affairs Committee).
1. Agenda:
Presentation of the
meeting agenda and accepted without additions or
deletions.
2. Minutes:
Motion: It was moved
(Tees, Herdman) that the minutes of the 7th Annual
Meeting be adopted as available through email and the
BBCS WEB site.
- Accepted as a friendly
amendment from Murray Singer was the inclusion within
Section 3.iv. of the names of Linda Wilson, Roger Wilson
and David Williams as additional organizers of the 7th
Annual Meeting. It was understood that the minutes of the
7th Meeting be altered to reflect such inclusion.
- Motion passed.
3. President's Report:
a) Business Arising from
minutes:
i) National Conference on
Psychology As A Science (May 8-11, 1997).
It was announced that a
report of this meeting (included BBCS delegates) has been
written and received by the BBCS Executive on behalf of
the Membership. The report will soon be available on the
BBCS web site.
The membership is invited
to suggest changes to the report. Copies will be provided
later to NSERC and MRC.
ii) Award Presentation
(D. O. Hebb Awards)
The first annual D. O.
Hebb Distinguished Contribution Award was made to Fergus
Craik at his Keynote Address on June 19, 1998.
Changes to the award
process to be discussed later this meeting by Vince Di
Lollo.
iii) NSERC Reallocation
Report.
The Reallocation
Committee (B. Kolb, R. Brown, V. Di Lollo, C. Herdman, C.
MacLeod, P. Jolicoeur, and J. Stewart) completed their
report last year but, as yet, the distribution of the
reallocation and new funds has not been announced by
NSERC. However, NSERC has announced an across-the-board
increase of 10% to all NSERC Operating Grants.
Members of BBCS were
encouraged to write letters of congratulation to
politicians for their support of the increased funding
awarded to NSERC.
The Membership gave an
enthusiastic round of applause to the Reallocation
Committee as a reflection of their appreciation for the
long and meritorious work completed.
Lorraine Allan is Chair
of the NSERC GSC-12 for 1998-99.
Name change: (as a result
of last year's meeting) the name Brain, Behaviour and
Cognitive Science was suggested to NSERC as a replacement
for the GSC 12 Psychology Committee. A counter-proposal
of the name Psychology: Brain and Behaviour was submitted
to NSERC from CPA.
- R. Tees was unclear how
the compromise (Psychology: Brain and Behaviour) related
to either our (BBCS) or the CPA proposal (BBCP), but
recommended that at this point it was up to NSERC to
decide on a name for their GSC and we should, for now,
accept whatever the decision was to be.
iv) Tri-Council Research
Ethics Code (Human)
R. Tees summarized the
development of this document from an earlier first draft
to which BBCS replied vigorously (largely through the
efforts of V. Di Lollo) to a second draft, replied to by
R. Tees, to what appears to be the construction of an as
yet unseen third draft.
- R. Brown as President
will be next in line to respond to such a document.
b) Liason Activities:
R. Tees described recent
efforts to develop (and the importance of doing so)
stronger relationships with a variety of professional
associations including CPA (CCDP, APA, EPS, IUPsyS, BDP,
CCR, and CRR).
- Steps taken include the
invitation to John Service (Executive Director of CPA)
and Abe Ross (of CCDP) to attend the BBCS annual meeting.
Both were in attendance at this meeting.
c) Future Conferences:
It was announced that the
annual meetings of BBCS will be held according to the
following tentative schedule:
June 18-19, 1999 -
Edmonton (coordinated with CPA)
July 19-21, 2000 -
Cambridge, U.K (in conjunction with the Experimental
Psychology Society)
June/July, 2001 - Toronto
(coordinated with CPA and APS)
June, 2002 -
Victoria/Vancouver (coordinated with CPA)
A straw vote on the
coordination of our meetings with the CPA and APS groups,
where possible, strongly favoured the proposal.
d) Membership:
Following last year's
meeting our current and potential membership was explored
by R. Tees. In 1997 BBCS had 248 paid members. As of this
meeting we have 411 paid members, a 65% increase in
membership. On the basis of university listings and the
NSERC database, R. Tees estimated that the total pool of
potential members is 700+.
The importance of
maintaining a healthy, substantial, and current
membership was emphasized and the Membership was
encouraged to motivate others to join BBCS. Discussion
followed of ways to maintain current membership (through
renewal notices, credit card billings, web site
possibilities, etc).
R. Tees reported that
scientists at each of 42 Canadian universities have been
identified have been contacted and asked to encourage
memberships to BBCS from people at their institutions.
e) Budget:
It was reported that over
the last year the balance in the BBCS account has risen
by 50% from approximately $26,000 to $39,000.
A discussion of the cost
of our conferences followed.
Motion (Klein/Craik):
That the BBCS Board be congratulated on its successful
efforts in improving the Society's financial situation
and that the budget be accepted as presented.
- Motion passed.
f) BBCS Board Election:
As a result of the
election held earlier this Spring, Lorraine Allan will
replace Don Read who has completed his 3- year term.
An earlier call for
nominations for President-Elect received one nomination:
Pierre Jolicoeur. A call for additional nominations was
made.
Motion (Herdman/Read):
That nominations cease.
- Motion passed. Pierre
Jolicoeur was declared elected as President-Elect.
Board membership for
1998-99 includes R. Brown (President), R. Tees
(Past-President), P. Jolicoeur (President- Elect), C.
Herdman, J. Stewart, and L. Allan.
4. Report on 1998 BBCS
Conference (C. Herdman)
The program this year
included 258 presentations and attendance exceeded 300.
Financial support was gained through the sale of
programs; funds were also provided by the Carleton
University offices of Vice-President Research, Dean of
Arts and Social Sciences, and Psychology Department.
Additionally funds were donated by publishers and used to
support the coffee breaks. Finally, the Communications
Research Center (Government of Canada) supported a
symposium and presentation by Brian Rogers.
Recognition of
assistance:
Special thanks and much
appreciation was extended to Ms. Lauren Meegan (BBCS
Administrator) who coordinated with great skill and care
many aspects of the conference including the call for
papers, accommodations, catering, poster boards, the web
site and construction of the program.
Others singled out as
providing exceptional contributions to the success of the
meeting were local organizers and faculty John Logan and
Jo-Anne LeFevre for assisting with the registration, room
setups, name tags and related tasks. Students who
provided considerable assistance were Brenda Smith and
Anna Toma.
Mike Masson was thanked
for his preconference workshop on results presentation
and to Gus Craik for his keynote address on aging and
divided attention tasks.
Finally, Chris Herdman
thanked all presenters and moderators for their
contributions to a successful meeting.
Richard Tees expressed
the great appreciation of the BBCS membership to Chris
Herdman for his central role in making the conference so
successful.
5. GSC-12 Reallocation
Report (Colin MacLeod)
C. MacLeod summarized
activities related to the development of the Reallocation
Report with emphases upon the issues of productivity,
training of qualified personnel, and changes to our field
(primarily in the development of cognitive neuroscience).
The Membership was encouraged to maintain accurate
records of accomplishments in areas of concern to NSERC.
- R Klein recommended
that a dropbox be included in the BBCS web site as a way
of encouraging BBCS members to contribute to an
up-to-date database that may be used as the basis for
rapid response to queries concerning the field and in
case of another reallocation exercise.
R. Tees thanked C.
MacLeod for the presentation and his assistance with the
Report.
6. Consortium of Canadian
Researchers (Chris Herdman)
C. Herdman described the
types of meetings he attended on behalf of BBCS and the
lobbying efforts of the CCR. The minutes of CCR meetings
are regularly forwarded to the BBCS Executive.
7. NSERC GSC-12 Business
(Lorraine Allan)
L. Allan described the
10% increase to grant holders and emphasized the need to
maintain records of personnel involved in one's lab
because the success and further training of these
individuals is important in subsequent grant proposals.
8. BASICS Conference
proposal (Mike Masson)
R. Tees indicated that at
the 7th BBCS meeting infrastructure support was offered
to BASICS (and other regional conferences). However,
because of the special nature of the 1998 BASICS meeting
a one-time financial grant of $300 was awarded in
support. M. Masson described the success of the 1998
meeting.
9. D. O./ Hebb Awards
(Vince Di Lollo)
i) D. O. Hebb
Distinguished Contribution Award: V. Di Lollo announced
that this year's winner is Gus Craik of the University of
Toronto.
- The process by which a
selection was made was described. The award committee
consisted of the 5 most recent past-presidents of BBCS
(Mel Goodale, Ray Klein, Bryan Kolb, Julien Doyon, and
Vince Di Lollo).
ii) D. O. Hebb Student
Award: The selection committee this year consisted of two
teams of two judges: Richard Brown and Richard Tees,
Colin MacLeod and Don Read. No student award selections
had been made by the time of the meeting because a poster
session, including many student posters, is to follow the
meeting. However, given the logistical difficulties of
attending and reviewing a very large number and variety
of presentations (papers and posters), there was
sentiment to alter the process by which a larger number
of awards might be made.
Motion (Di Lollo/Tees):
a) That up to 2 D. O Hebb
Student Awards be given each year; and
b) That the decision as
to the number of awards made be at the discretion of the
selection committee; and
c) That the judging
committee be appointed by the Conference Organizing
Committee each year.
- Motion (a, b, c)
passed.
10. Liason With CPA:
R. Tees described the
relationship with CPA by which BBCS delegates (R. Tees,
J. Stewart, C. Herdman, and A. Kingstone) attend the CPA
general meetings. Acknowledgement of their efforts in
doing so was given.
11. Other Business:
Motion (Herdman/Read):
That elections be held by e-mail ballot.
- Motion passed.
12. Next Meeting (Alan
Kingstone):
Date and place is June
18-19 in Edmonton. Local organizer is A. Kingstone. The
Membership was encouraged to provide Alan with
information useful to the construction of the next
meeting.
13. Comments by New
President (Richard Brown):
R. Brown expressed thanks
to Richard Tees and Vince Di Lollo for their substantial
efforts on behalf of the BBCS membership.
R. Brown also provided
brief comments on the need for a strong BBCS organization
in the face of new perspectives taken by NSERC funding.
14. Adjournment
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